Reading for the Day

1. A history of Chinese Food in America Having grown up in South America - I have a slightly different take on this article. Much like this country - in every small town in Ecuador there is at least one "Chifa" or chinese restaurant. One near our house was called "Chifa Lung Fung" which caused generalized coughing every time we thought about it. I always assumed that the prevalence of this line of work among Chinese imigrants had to do with cultural diferences that made cooking viable work for men - unlike latin american "machista" culture. The article in the NYT explains things more simply - a successful pattern was copied by successive immigrant families. 2. Muckraker extrodinaire I.F. Stone's expose on The Trial of Socrates. It goes without saying that this questions the hegemonic influence that Plato has on the history of philosophy. Good reading that I wish I'd seen back in the day when I was comparing Plato to everyone; Marx, Buddah, etc.